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US-backed forces say battle to retake Raqqa from Isis 'will take months'
Source: The Guardian
US-backed forces say battle to retake Raqqa from Isis 'will take months'
Diplomats plan for the fall of Isis, as Kurdish and Arab fighters continue to push forward into the terror group’s Syrian stronghold
Martin Chulov in Beirut
Thursday 6 July 2017 06.05 BST
US-backed forces encircling Raqqa expect the fight to oust the remnants of Islamic State from its most symbolic Syrian stronghold to take at least three months, despite rapid advances towards the city centre this week.
The advance met with fierce resistance on Wednesday, as Isis fighters used an eighth-century fortified wall as a buffer against Kurdish and Arab fighters known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), who had been claiming neighbourhoods of the city, while steadily closing in from its surrounds.
With the wall now breached, and Raqqa all but encircled, the fate of at least 60,000 residents trapped inside is growing increasingly desperate. A volunteer fighter with Kurdish troops said as many as 50 airstrikes were hitting Raqqa each day, and observers suggested that as many as half of the reported 740 civilian deaths in Syria last month may have been caused by bombs dropped on the city by aircraft of the US-led coalition.
“We also see a lot of drone bombs,” said Paul Hatfield, an American volunteer with Kurdish forces. “We had hundreds of them since we started in Raqqa.”
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Diplomats plan for the fall of Isis, as Kurdish and Arab fighters continue to push forward into the terror group’s Syrian stronghold
Martin Chulov in Beirut
Thursday 6 July 2017 06.05 BST
US-backed forces encircling Raqqa expect the fight to oust the remnants of Islamic State from its most symbolic Syrian stronghold to take at least three months, despite rapid advances towards the city centre this week.
The advance met with fierce resistance on Wednesday, as Isis fighters used an eighth-century fortified wall as a buffer against Kurdish and Arab fighters known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), who had been claiming neighbourhoods of the city, while steadily closing in from its surrounds.
With the wall now breached, and Raqqa all but encircled, the fate of at least 60,000 residents trapped inside is growing increasingly desperate. A volunteer fighter with Kurdish troops said as many as 50 airstrikes were hitting Raqqa each day, and observers suggested that as many as half of the reported 740 civilian deaths in Syria last month may have been caused by bombs dropped on the city by aircraft of the US-led coalition.
“We also see a lot of drone bombs,” said Paul Hatfield, an American volunteer with Kurdish forces. “We had hundreds of them since we started in Raqqa.”
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/06/us-backed-forces-say-battle-to-retake-raqqa-from-isis-will-take-months